House: The Mercer House, now called the Mercer-Williams House Museum, is located at 429 Bull Street and stands at the southwest end of Monterey Square, in Savannah, Georgia.

Address: 421-425 Bull St, Savannah, GA 31401, USA (32.07125, -81.0954)PlaceDesign by John S. Norris (1804-1876)The house was the scene of the shooting death of Jim Williams' assistant, Danny Lewis Hansford, a story that is retold in the 1994 John Berendt book “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.” The house is currently owned by Dorothy Kingery, Williams' sister, and is open to the public for tours. Designed for General Hugh Weedon Mercer (great-grandfather of the songwriter Johnny Mercer) construction of the house began in 1860. Interrupted by the American Civil War, it was finally completed around 1868 by the new owner, John Wilder. For a period in the XX century, the building was used as the Savannah Shriners Alee Temple. It then lay vacant for a decade until in 1969 when Jim Williams, one of Savannah’s earliest and most dedicated private restorationists, bought the house and restored it. Before Hansford's death, the house had already been the scene of two deaths. In 1913 a previous owner tripped over the second floor banister, fractured his hip, and suffered a concussion, dying three days later. In 1969, a boy chasing pigeons on the roof fell over the edge and impaled himself on the iron fence below.

Mercer House, by Elisa Rolle (own work)

LifeWho: James Arthur "Jim" Williams (December 11, 1930 – January 14, 1990)James Arthur Williams was the only person in the state of Georgia ever to be tried four times for the same crime. Following the May 2, 1981 shooting death of assistant Danny Lewis Hansford in his Savannah home, Mercer House, Williams was charged with murder and tried four times. He was found not guilty at the final trial. Born in Gordon, Georgia, Williams was a noted Savannah, Georgia antiques dealer and historic preservationist who played an active role in the preservation of Savannah's historic district. In 1955, at the age of 24, he bought and restored his first three houses located at 541, 543 and 545 E Congress St, Savannah, GA 31401. Over the next 35 years, he would restore more than 50 homes in Savannah as well as the lowcountry of Georgia and South Carolina. Notable Savannah houses he restored include: Odingsell House, Merault House, Hampton Lillibridge House (507 E Saint Julian Street, Savannah, GA 31401), Habersham's Pink House (23 Abercorn St, Savannah, GA 31401), Armstrong House (447 Bull St, Savannah, GA 31401) and Mercer House. At the time of the purchase, the Mercer House had been vacant for almost a decade since its former occupants, the Shriners organization, had used the building for their Alee Temple. Over the course of two years, Williams painstakingly restored the house. After the restoration, it became his personal residence and he ran his antiques restoration business out of the carriage house located behind the mansion. Williams died in 1990 and is buried at Ramah First Baptist Church (502 Ramah Dr, Palmetto, GA 30268), next to his mother, Blanche Brooks Williams. Danny Lewis "Billy Hanson" Hansford (1960-1981) was Savannah's most popular male escort of the late 1970's and early '80's. Hansford, famed for his muscular build by both male and female clients, was often seen in his "trademark" white t-shirt and jeans. At the time of his death he was 21 years old. He is buried at Greenwich Cemetery (330 Greenwich Rd, Savannah, GA 31404).

James "Jimmy" Trimble. In 1942 and 1943 sports fans in the Washington area were amazed by the tremendous fastball of a young pitcher. Trimble grew up in Chevy Chase, Maryland where he was an All-Star on his high school baseball team. Born: October 10, 1925, Washington, D.C., United StatesDied: 1945, Iwo Jima, Ogasawara, Tokyo, Tokyo, JapanBuried: Rock Creek Cemetery, Washington, District of Columbia, District Of Columbia, USA, Plot: Section 1, Grave 36-1Buried alongside: Gore VidalFind A Grave Memorial# 4733

Cemetery: In November 2003, Howard Austen died; later, in February 2005, he was re-buried at Rock Creek Cemetery, in Washington, D.C., in a joint grave meant for both Gore Vidal and Austen.

PlaceRock Creek Cemetery is an 86-acre (350,000 m2) cemetery with a natural rolling landscape located at Rock Creek Church Road, NW, and Webster Street, NW, off Hawaii Avenue, NE in Washington, D.C.’s Petworth neighborhood. It is across the street from the historic Soldiers’ Home and the Soldiers’ Home Cemetery. It also is home to the InterFaith Conference of Metropolitan Washington. It was first established in 1719 as a churchyard within the glebe of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Rock Creek Parish. The Vestry later decided to expand the burial ground as a public cemetery to serve the city of Washington and this was established through an Act of Congress in 1840. The expanded Cemetery was landscaped in the rural garden style, to function as both a cemetery and a public park. It is a ministry of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Rock Creek Parish with sections for St. John’s Russian Orthodox Church and St. Nicholas Orthodox Church. Rock Creek Cemetery’s park-like setting has many notable mausoleums, sculptures, and tombstones. The best known is Augustus Saint-Gaudens and Stanford White’s Adams Memorial, a contemplative, androgynous bronze sculpture seated before a block of granite. It marks the graves of Marian Hooper “Clover" Adams and her husband, Henry Adams, and sometimes mistakenly, the sculpture is referred to as Grief. Saint-Gaudens entitled it The Mystery of the Hereafter and The Peace of God that Passeth Understanding. Other notable memorials include the Frederick Keep Monument, the Heurich Mausoleum, the Hitt Monument, the Hardon Monument, the Kauffman Monument, known as The Seven Ages of Memory, the Sherwood Mausoleum Door, and the Thompson-Harding Monument.

LifeWho: Eugene Louis Vidal (October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) aka Gore Vidal and Howard Auster (1929 – September 22, 2003) aka Howard AustenGore Vidal and Howard Austen are buried side by side at Rock Creek Cemetery. Near them there is also Henry Adams, the American journalist, novelist, academic and historian who featured in Vidal’s books, and the great love of Gore Vidal’s life, Jimmy Trimble. Gore Vidal’s second novel, “The City and the Pillar” (1948) caused a moralistic furor over his dispassionate presentation of a young protagonist coming to terms with his homosexuality and a male homosexual relationship. The novel was dedicated to "J.T."; decades later, Vidal confirmed that the initials were those of James Trimble III, killed in the Battle of Iwo Jima on 1 March 1945; and that Jimmie Trimble was the only person Gore Vidal ever loved.

Mercedes de Acosta was an American poet, playwright, and novelist. Four of de Acosta's plays were produced, and she published a novel and three volumes of poetry. Born: March 1, 1893, New York City, New York, United StatesDied: May 9, 1968, New York City, New York, United StatesLived: 471 Park Ave, New York, NY 10017, USA558 North Bristol Avenue Buried: Trinity Church Cemetery and Mausoleum, Manhattan, New York County (Manhattan), New York, USAFind A Grave Memorial# 8744496Spouse: Abram Poole (m. 1920–1935)Movies: Rasputin and the EmpressParents: Ricardo de Acosta, Micaela Hernandez de Alba y de Alba

In 1920, Eva Le Gallienne became involved with poet, novelist and playwright Mercedes de Acosta. She and de Acosta began their romance shortly after de Acosta's marriage to Abram Poole, which strained their relationship. Still, they vacationed and travelled together often, at times visiting the salon of famed writer and socialite Natalie Clifford Barney. De Acosta wrote two plays for Le Gallienne, Sandro Botticelli and Jehanne de Arc. After five years and the financial failures of both plays, they ended their relationship. De Acosta had five siblings: Aida, Ricardo Jr., Angela, Maria, and Rita. Rita became a famous beauty best known as Rita Lydig. She was photographed by Baron Adolph de Meyer, Edward Steichen, and Gertrude Käsebier, sculpted in alabaster by Malvina Hoffman, and painted by Giovanni Boldini and John Singer Sargent among others.

Mercedes de Acosta was an American poet, playwright, and novelist. She was professionally unsuccessful but is known for her many lesbian affairs with famous personalities and numerous friendships with prominent artists of the period. De Acosta's best-known relationship was with Greta Garbo. When Garbo's close friend, author Salka Viertel, introduced them in 1931, they quickly became involved. As their relationship developed, it became erratic and volatile with Garbo always in control. The two were very close sporadically and then apart for lengthy periods when Garbo, annoyed by Mercedes' obsessive behavior, coupled with her own neuroses, ignored her. In any case, they remained friends for thirty years during which time Garbo wrote de Acosta 181 letters, cards, and telegrams. About their friendship, Cecil Beaton, who was close to both women, recorded in his 1958 memoir, "Mercedes is [Garbo's] very best friend and for 30 years has stood by her, willing to devote her life to her".

Mercedes de Acosta was involved in numerous lesbian relationships with Broadway’s and Hollywood's elite and did not attempt to hide her sexuality, which was rare in her generation. In 1916, she began an affair with actress Alla Nazimova and later with dancer Isadora Duncan. After her relationship with actress Eva Le Gallienne ended, she was involved with several famous actresses and dancers including Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Ona Munson, and Russian ballerina Tamara Platonovna Karsavina. Additional unsubstantiated rumors include Pola Negri, Eleonora Duse, Katharine Cornell, and Alice B. Toklas. Mercedes threatened to throw Dietrich into a swimming pool if she continued to send flowers (Dietrich had been inundating Acosta with tulips, roses, and orchids). Unlike her professional celebrity, which was carefully crafted and maintained, Marlene Dietrich's personal life was kept out of public view. Dietrich, who was bisexual, enjoyed the thriving gay scene of the time and drag balls of 1920s Berlin. She also defied conventional gender roles through her boxing at Turkish trainer and prizefighter Sabri Mahir’s boxing studio in Berlin, which opened to women in the late 1920s. As Austrian writer Hedwig (Vicki) Baum recalls in her memoir, "I don't know how the feminine element sneaked into those masculine realms [the boxing studio], but in any case, only three or four of us were tough enough to go through with it (Marlene Dietrich was one)."

No. 465, The Ritz Tower, 10022: Built in 1925 as the city’s most elegant apartment hotel, The Ritz Tower today remains one of Manhattan’s most luxurious and sought-after residential cooperatives noted for its spacious and elegant apartments, each one unique. Greta Garbo (1905-1990) lived here for a time in the 40s. Most happy about this move was probably Mercedes de Acosta (1893-1968), who had an apartment at 471 Park Avenue, 10022 from where she could see Garbo's north facing rooms. Mercedes told the story that during the wartime, when people were not allowed to show light at night “we gave each other signs with candles. Why we were not arrested for this offence is still today a riddle to me.” In 1951 Garbo moved from the Ritz into a suite with four rooms located on the seventeenth floor of The Hampshire House at 150 Central Park South, 10019.

Church: Trinity Church Cemetery consists of three separate burial grounds associated with Trinity Church in Manhattan, New York, US. The first was established in the Churchyard located at 74 Trinity Place at Wall Street and Broadway. In 1842, the church, running out of space in its churchyard, established Trinity Church Cemetery and Mausoleum in Upper Manhattan between Broadway and Riverside Drive, at the Chapel of the Intercession (now The Church of the Intercession, New York), formerly the location of John James Audubon's estate. A third burial place is the Churchyard of St. Paul's Chapel.

PlaceThe burial grounds have been the final resting place for many historic figures since the Churchyard cemetery opened in 1697. A non-denominational cemetery, it is the only remaining active cemetery in Manhattan. There are two bronze plaques at the Church of the Intercession cemetery commemorating the Battle of Fort Washington, which included some of the fiercest fighting of the Revolutionary War. Trinity Church Cemetery, along with Broadway, marks the center of the Heritage Rose District of NYC. Trinity Church was the site of ACT UP's first demonstration against Wall Street profiteering from AIDS. Site of a second demonstration a year later. Protesters marched from Trinity to the intersection of Broadway and Wall Street.

Notable queer burials at Trinity Church’s burial grounds:• Mercedes De Acosta (1893-1968), Trinity Church Cemetery and Mausoleum, author. Alice B. Toklas said of her, "Say what you will about Mercedes, she's had the most important women in the twentieth century." Her lovers included Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Isadora Duncan, stage actress Eva Le Galliene, and Tallulah Bankhead. • John W. Mulligan (died in 1862), Trinity Churchyard. Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben legally adopted two soldiers, William North and Benjamin Walker. John W. Mulligan Jr., also considered himself one of Steuben’s sons. His birth father, John “Hercules” Mulligan, had been Alexander Hamilton’s roommate many years before. Steuben left his estate to Captains Benjamin Walker and William North. John Mulligan inherited Von Steuben’s vast library, collection of maps and $2,500 in cash.• Charles Woodcock-Savage (1850-1923), Trinity Church Cemetery and Mausoleum, was a New Yorker who achieved notoriety as the lover of King Karl of Württemberg, by some decades his elder. Charles Woodcock was born in New York City, the son of Jonas Gurnee Woodcock (1822–1908) and Sarah Savage Woodcock (1824–1893). He went abroad to study and found a place as chamberlain at the court of Württemberg, where he became the favorite of the king, who had had several previous favorites. In 1888 Karl named Charles Woodcock "Baron Woodcock-Savage" creating an uproar that sent Woodcock back to New York in 1890. In New York he adopted the last name "Savage." In 1906 Charles Woodcock-Savage published “A Lady in Waiting: Being extracts from the diary of Julie de Chesnil, sometime lady-in-waiting to her Majesty, Queen Marie Antoinette.” He dedicated it "To a Noble Soul I Knew and Loved and Mourn." The King had died in 1891.

Konstantin Somov was a Russian artist associated with the Mir Iskusstva (The World of Art). Born into a family of a major art historian and Hermitage Museum curator Andrey Ivanovich Somov, he became interested in the 18th-century art and music at an early age. Somov studied at the Imperial Academy of Arts under Ilya Repin from 1888 to 1897. While at the Academy, he befriended Alexandre Benois, who would introduce him to Sergei Diaghilev and Léon Bakst. When the three founded the World of Art, Somov liberally contributed to its periodicals. Somov was homosexual, like many of the World of Art members. On September 15, 1906, Mikhail Kuzmin depicts in his diary what was apparently his first sexual experience with more than one partner. The two happened to be a young man, Pavlik Maslov, Kuzmin’s lover at that time, and Konstantin Somov, Kuzmin’s close friend. After rather detailed description of the sexual encounter, Kuzmin remarks in his diary: “What an unexpected event. I was asking K.A. [Somov]: ‘Is it possible that our life will not remain for posterity?’ – ‘If these terrible diaries are preserved – then it will remain, and in the next epoch, we will be considered Marquises de Sade.’ Today I understood the importance of our art and our life.” On June 14, 2007, Somov's landscape The Rainbow (1927) was sold at Christie's for US$7.33 million, a record for a work of Russian art.

Cemetery: The Volkovo Cemetery (Rasstannyy pr-d, 3, Sankt-Peterburg, Russia, 192007) is one of the largest and oldest non-Orthodox cemeteries in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Until the early XX century it was one of the main burial grounds for Lutheran Germans in Russia. It is estimated that over 100,000 people have been buried at this cemetery since 1773. Notable queer burials: Vsevolod Knyazev (died 1913) and Mikhail Kuzmin (1872-1936).

Oliver Baldwin was a British politician, son of three-time Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin. The Daily Mail on August 5, 1931, was dominated by a story claiming that Oliver Baldwin was living with a man named John Boyle. “We do not know if Mr. Oliver Baldwin and Mr. John Boyle are indulging in unnatural vice, but if they are committing criminal acts the police should be informed and a criminal prosecution brought.” That afternoon Stanley Baldwin gave a press conference with his wife Lucy and Oliver. He said that Oliver had the love and support of himself and his wife. They knew that he and John Boyle were close friends and were living together. What they did in their personal lives was no one's business and certainly not a matter for the law. In 1948, Oliver was appointed Governor of the Leeward Islands and took John Boyle with him.

PlaceGeorge Parker, 2nd Earl of Macclesfield (c.1695–1764), celebrated as an astronomer, spent much time conducting astronomical observations at Shirburn Castle, which his father had bought in 1716. Here he built an observatory and a chemical laboratory. The observatory was "equipped with the finest existing instruments" and the 2nd Earl of Macclesfield used it from 1740. In 1761 the astronomer Thomas Hornsby observed the transit of Venus from the castle grounds. The Macclesfield Psalter, a lavishly illuminated manuscript from the English region of East Anglia, written in Latin and produced around 1330, was discovered in Shirburn Castle in 2004 when the contents of the Library were catalogued for auction. The present owner of the castle is the Beechwood Estates Company, the Macclesfield family estate management company. Following a long-running and acrimonious court battle, Richard Timothy George Mansfield Parker, the 9th Earl of Macclesfield, was evicted from the family seat at the end of 2004. The castle was used for external shots of Midsomer Priory for the popular television series “Midsomer Murders.”

LifeWho: Oliver Ridsdale Baldwin, 2nd Earl Baldwin of Bewdley (March 1, 1899 – August 10, 1958) and John Parke Boyle (July 30, 1893 – February 24, 1969)On his return from Armenia Oliver Baldwin made two major decisions. First, any talk of engagement to Dorothea Arbuthnot was a fraud; he was homosexual and needed to live the rest of his life with a male partner, whom he found in the person of John Parke Boyle, the son of an army officer, descended from the earls of Cork. Together they set up home in Oxfordshire, first at Shirburn and then at North Stoke, keeping geese and hens and taking in lodgers, with Oliver trying to make money by writing. He refused to accept money from his father, except for small cheques at Christmas or for his birthday. Second, Oliver decided his politics lay decisively on the left. The substance of an interview he gave to the Westminster Gazette was taken up by Fred Gorle of the Social Democratic Federation. Baldwin was invited to become a member, which he immediately did. H. M. Hyndman, the guiding spirit of the SDF, remained his political inspiration for the rest of his life. Some members of his family thought that the adoption of socialism was deeply treacherous, but Stanley Baldwin was always warm, generous and understanding of the idealism of his elder son. His mother, coming from a background where the questioning of received ideas was not just possible but expected, was also supportive, and on a personal level too – she wrote to John Boyle to say, “Thank you for loving my Oliver.” Oliver Baldwin threw a party in honour of his father, on December 15, 1938. In Oliver’s words “it was a wonderful evening and made the old man very happy.” The following day Stanley wrote to his son, “I enjoyed every minute of your happy party last night. In the excitement of leaving I don’t believe I said Good Night to Johnny, whose work as caterer was beyond praise. Bless you. Your loving old Father.” Oliver’s parents treated John Boyle as an ideal son-in-law and would begin letters to him with “My dear Johnny.” John Parke Boyle was the son of Major Charles John Boyle and Lillian Kennedy Pochin. He was educated at Bradfield School and was invested as a Fellow, Zoological Society (F.Z.S.) His sister Lilian Joanna Vere Boyle married George Loveden William Henry Parker (1888-1975), 7th Earl of Macclesfield, son of George Augustus Parker, Viscount Parker and Carine Agnes Loveden, on 9 June 1909. For a time, Oliver and John lived at Shirburn at John’s brother-in-law’s castle, before moving to North Stoke. John Parke Boyle is buried at St Mary the Virgin (Church Lane, North Stoke, Oxfordshire, OX10 6BQ).

House: Astley Hall is a country house in Astley near Stourport-on-Severn, Worcestershire. The hall is significant as the home of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, who died here in 1947. It is now operated as a nursing home by Heritage Manor Ltd and known as Astley Hall Care Home.

PlaceAstley Hall is a small, three storey country house set in 20 acres of parkland, situated two miles outside Stourport-on-Severn. The house consists of a main block that is linked to an L-shaped stable wing. In addition, the estate features a separate park lodge (Baldwin Lodge), formal garden and kitchen garden. The present buildings date from mid-XIX century with early XX century additions. To the right of the main house is a stone Tudor arched garden entrance, to the left of the main house is a slightly later cross-gabled extension with clock and brick stable range with stone dressings. The main house is an ashlar construction with slate roof. On the roof there are grouped chimneys with decorative shafting. The Jacobean façade features a 3-storey 3-bay centre block and 2-storey single bay wings with cornices, parapets and shaped gables. The outer bays of main block have 2-storey angled bay windows with open parapets. Access to the main house is via a semi-circular headed doorway with rusticated arch and a Ionic motif above a keystone. Above the porch is inscribed "SLB 1912,” which refers to the date of the final acquisition of the house and additions to it by Stanley and Lucy Baldwin. The porch is flanked by a transomed window and Ionic pilasters. On the interior, the entrance lobby has a Jacobean strapwork ceiling. On the garden front, the main house is slightly plainer with a 2-storey pedimented porch containing a coat of arms. The extension to the right has on first floor Ionic 3-bay loggia with arched central bay, a further extension to right terminates in a rendered pavilion possibly concealing water tower. The main house at Astley Hall was built between 1830 and 1850 for the Lea family. Thomas Simcox Lea, of Astley Hall, was High Sheriff of Worcestershire in 1845. At the beginning of the XX century it was sold to Stanley Baldwin, who lived at Astley Hall from 1902 until his death in 1947. In 1912 he managed to buy the whole of the house and its additions. Lucy Baldwin died of a heart attack at Astley Hall in June 1945. Stanley Baldwin, then 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, continued to live at Astley Hall until his death there on 1December 4, 1947. After Lord Baldwin’s death, Astley Hall was sold and became a school, and later a care home. Astley Hall was acquired by its current owners in May 2012. It is now in institutional use as a nursing home and not open to the public.

LifeWho: Oliver Ridsdale Baldwin, 2nd Earl Baldwin of Bewdley (March 1, 1899 – August 10, 1958) and John Parke Boyle (July 30, 1893 – February 24, 1969)Oliver Baldwin, 2nd Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, known as Viscount Corvedale from 1937 to 1947, was a British socialist politician who had a career at political odds with his father, the Conservative prime minister Stanley Baldwin. Educated at Eton, which he hated, Baldwin left as soon as he could. After serving in the army during WWI he undertook various jobs, including a brief appointment as an officer in the Armenian army, and wrote journalism and books on a range of topics. He served two terms as a Labour Member of Parliament between 1929 and 1947. Baldwin never achieved ministerial office in Britain. His last post was as Governor of the Leeward Islands, from 1948 to 1950. After WWII Baldwin served briefly as British Vice-Consul in Boulogne, and then travelled in north Africa. He refused to be supported by his father, and earned a living as a journalist and travel writer. A chance meeting in Alexandria led to an appointment as an infantry instructor in the newly-independent Armenia, but soon after he took up the post in 1920 the democratic government collapsed and Baldwin was imprisoned by Bolshevik-backed revolutionaries. He was freed two months later when democracy was restored, but en route back to Britain he was arrested by the Turkish authorities, accused of spying for Soviet Russia. He was held for five months, in grim conditions, with execution a constant threat. He later wrote a book about his experiences, called “Six Prisons and Two Revolutions.” After his release Baldwin returned to Britain, and in 1922 was briefly engaged to Dorothea ("Doreen") Arbuthnot, the daughter of a political ally of his father. Coming to terms with the fact that he was homosexual, Baldwin broke off the engagement, and settled with John ("Johnnie") Boyle. Described in The New Statesman as "a charming ne’er-do-well,” Boyle, who was six years older than Baldwin, became his lifelong partner. Boyle’s family came from Oxfordshire, where he and Baldwin set up home together, living in what the biographer Christopher J Walker describes as "gentle, amicable, animal-loving, primitive, homosexual socialism.” Oliver’s mother, Lucy, arrived to write to Johnnie “Thank you for loving my Oliver.” In February 1948 Baldwin was appointed Governor and Commander in Chief of the Leeward Islands, a British colonial territory in the Caribbean. Boyle accompanied him, to the disapproval of some of the British establishment in Antigua. Partly for this reason, and partly because Baldwin made no secret of his continuing socialist views or his desire for multiracial inclusiveness, he was recalled in 1950.

PlaceEaton Square is a residential garden square in London’s Belgravia district. Eaton Square is one of the three garden squares built by the Grosvenor family when they developed the main part of Belgravia in the XIX century, and is named after Eaton Hall, the Grosvenor country house in Cheshire. Eaton Square is larger but less grand than the central feature of the district, Belgrave Square, and both larger and grander than Chester Square. The first block was laid out by Thomas Cubitt from 1827.

Notable queer residents at Eaton Square:• No. 1, SW1W 9DA, Engligh Blue Plaque: Robert, Lord Boothby (1900-1986), “Politician, Author and Broadcaster lived here 1946-1986.” Often known as Bob Boothby, was a British Conservative politician. Boothby was openly bisexual, in a time when male homosexual activity was a criminal offence. While an undergraduate at Magdalen College, Oxford, Boothby earned the nickname "the Palladium", because "he was twice nightly". He later spoke about the role of a speculated homosexual relationship in the drowning of his friend Michael Llewelyn Davies (one of the models for Peter Pan) and fellow Oxonian Rupert Buxton. From 1954 he campaigned publicly for homosexual law reform. In 1963 Boothby began an illicit affair with East End cat burglar Leslie Holt (died 1979), a younger man he met at a gambling club. Holt introduced him to the gangster Ronald Kray, the younger, homosexual, Kray twin. After his death from a heart attack in Westminster Hospital, London, aged 86, Boothby's ashes were scattered at Rattray Head near Crimond, Aberdeenshire, off the coast of his former constituency.• No. 93, SW1W 9AQ, Engligh Blue Plaque: Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley (1867-1947), “Prime Minister lived here”. Oliver Baldwin (1899-1958) was born at Astley Hall, Worcestershire, the elder son of the businessman Stanley Baldwin and his wife Lucy, née Ridsdale. Baldwin senior was elected a Conservative MP in 1908, and rose within fifteen years to become prime minister. Coming to terms with the fact that he was homosexual, Oliver Baldwin broke off his engagement, and settled with John ("Johnnie") Boyle. Described in The New Statesman as "a charming ne’er-do-well,” Boyle, who was six years older than Baldwin, became his lifelong partner. Boyle’s family came from Oxfordshire, where he and Baldwin set up home together, living in what the biographer Christopher J Walker describes as "gentle, amicable, animal-loving, primitive, homosexual socialism.”• Admiral Henry John Codrington lived at No. 112, SW1W 9AE, South side of Eaton Square. Emily Faithfull (1835-1895) had been companion to Mrs. Helen Codrington for 10 years. When Admiral Henry John Codrington returned from the Crimea, he told Emily to leave the house, threatening to have the reason for her dismissal made public. Codrington (1808-1877) was a Royal Navy officer. As a junior officer, he saw action supporting the blockade of Algiers by Greek revolutionaries during the Greek War of Independence and was later present at the Battle of Navarino during the same war. He later undertook a survey of enemy positions prior to the bombardment of Acre during the Egyptian–Ottoman War. As a captain, Codrington provided refuge on board ship for Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany and his family who were fleeing from revolutionary forces and then commanded the HMS Royal George in the Baltic Sea during the Crimean War. He went on to be Admiral superintendent of Malta Dockyard and then Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth. In April 1849 Codrington married Helen Jane Webb; they had two daughters. Following a much publicised divorce in 1864 in which the Admiral accused his first wife of having a close relationship with Emily Faithfull, he married Catherine Aitchison (née Compton) in August 1869. Helen Codrington, the younger of the two daughters of Henry Codrington, married in 1878 John Roche Dasent, the eldest son of George Webbe Dasent. Anne Jane Codrington married in 1882, Henry Stormont (Finch-Hatton), 13th Earl of Winchilsea and 8th Earl of Nottingham, descendent of Sir John Finch. When Admiral Codrington filed for divorce on grounds of adultery, Helen Codrington counterclaimed with the accusation that in October 1856 he had attempted to rape Faithfull while she was a guest in their house. At first, Emily Faithfull agreed to give evidence on behalf of Mrs. Codrington but later changed her mind. N° 111 and 112 in Eaton Square was sold in 2010 for 24 million pound.

Church: Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510), artist, is buried inside the Church of All Saints (Borgo Ognissanti, 42, 50123 Firenze). He was a contemporary of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, and is considered one of the best painters of the XV century. He was pupil of painter Filippo Lippi and worked for the House of Medici. His works include the paintings "Adorazione del Magi," "Nascita di Venere" and "Allegoria de la Primavera." He also worked on the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican.

Violet Trefusis was an English writer and socialite. She was the daughter of Alice Keppel, a mistress of King Edward VII. She is chiefly remembered for her lesbian affair with the poet Vita Sackville-West. The affair was featured in novels by both parties, and in Virginia Woolf's Orlando: A Biography: in this romanticized biography of Vita, Trefusis appears as the Russian princess Sasha. Trefusis was an inspiration to many writers' fiction and was a pivotal character in their novels including Nancy Mitford's Love in a Cold Climate as "Lady Montdore" and in Harold Acton's The Soul's Gymnasium as "Muriel", a fictional portrait of her. When she was 10, Violet met Vita (who was two years older) for the first time. Despite Vita and Violet’s marriages, they remained close until 1921, with a lot of passion and jealousy in the middle. From 1923 on, Trefusis was one of the many lovers of the Singer sewing machine heiress, Winnaretta Singer, daughter of Isaac Singer and wife of the homosexual Prince Edmond de Polignac, who introduced her to the artistic beau-monde in Paris. Vita died in 1962. Violet died at L'Ombrellino on the Bellosguardo in 1972.

PlaceIn 1898, 29-year-old Alice Keppel met Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII), the 56-year-old heir apparent to the throne. It was not long before she became one of Edward’s many mistresses, despite a twenty-six-year age difference. The Prince immediately made her "La Favorita" and his semi-official mistress. Keppel lived at 30 Portman Square, where Edward visited her regularly; her husband conveniently left during the visits. Her relationship with Edward would last through his ascension to the throne in 1901 until his death in 1910. Keppel was one of the few people in Edward VII’s circle who was able to smooth his strange mood swings. She was able to turn the cranky monarch into a happy man. Sir Harold Acton described Keppel, "None could compete with her glamour as a hostess. She could have impersonated Britannia in a tableau vivant and done that lady credit." Keppel was the inspiration behind the character "Mrs. Romola Cheyne" in Vita Sackville-West’s novel, “The Edwardians.” Through her youngest daughter, Sonia Cubitt, Keppel is the great-grandmother of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, the second wife of Charles, Prince of Wales. Portman Square is a square in London, part of the Portman Estate. It is located at the western end of Wigmore Street, which connects it to Cavendish Square to its east. It was built between 1765 and 1784 on land belonging to Henry William Portman. It included residences of Alexander Hamilton, 10th Duke of Hamilton, Sir Brook Bridges, 3rd Baronet, Henry Pelham-Clinton, 4th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne, George Keppel, 6th Earl of Albemarle, Sir Charles Asgill, 1st Baronet and William Henry Percy. Alexander Duff, 1st Duke of Fife maintained his London residence at No. 15 Portman Square. No. 30 is currently the Churchill Hotel, incorporating the Michelin-starred Locanda Locatelli.In 1929, Gerald Heard (1889-1971) and Christopher Wood (1900-1976) moved to 28 Portman Square, Marylebone, London W1H 6LL, where they inhabited a modern new luxury flat overlooking the roof garden of Selfridge’s department store, with “a cat which tone[d] in perfectly with the furnishings.” Like Heard, Wood had had an unhappy childhood. Born Christopher William Graham Wood to a wealthy wholesale grocery family in Lambeth, Surrey, his mother died in childbirth, and his father remarried and died shortly thereafter. His father, Graham Wood, bequeathed to him the bulk of his estate (valued at 101,556 pounds in 1905) and the guardianship of a jealous stepmother. Wood and Heard had grown in opposite directions from their early experiences: where Wood had learned to hang back, Heard had learned to entertain. Where Heard sought pleasure in ideas and spirituality and clothes, Wood sought it almost entirely in things. Where Heard dedicated himself to his writing, Wood never completed his Cambridge degree. Christopher Isherwood described Wood as “the spoilt, wayward younger son, with his airplane, his musical boxes, his superbicycle and all his other dangerous or expensive amusements and toys.” E.M. Forster took a definite dislike to Wood, describing him as “that shit.” Heard and Wood were like two sides of one person, which, according to Isherwood, gave them the air of brothers. Wood looked after Heard’s material needs, and his inheritance allowed Heard a better lifestyle than he could have achieved on his own. Still, he complained of poverty whenever Wood left town.

LifeWho: Violet Trefusis, née Keppel; (June 6, 1894 – February 29, 1972) Violet Trefusis was a writer and socialite. She is chiefly remembered for her lengthy affair with the poet Vita Sackville-West, which the two women continued after their respective marriages to men. Trefusis wrote novels and non-fiction works, both in English and French. The affair was featured in novels by both parties, in Virginia Woolf’s novel “Orlando: A Biography,” and in many letters and memoirs of the period, roughly 1912–1922. Many are preserved at Yale University Library. Trefusis also inspired other fiction and was featured as a pivotal character in these novels, including Lady Montdore in Nancy Mitford’s “Love in a Cold Climate” and Muriel in Harold Acton’s “The Soul’s Gymnasium.” Born Violet Keppel, she was the daughter of Alice Keppel, later a mistress of King Edward VII of the United Kingdom, and her husband, The Hon. George Keppel, a son of the 7th Earl of Albemarle. Members of the Keppel family thought her biological father was William Beckett, subsequently 2nd Baron Grimthorpe, a banker and MP for Whitby.

House: Violet Trefusis published several novels, some in English, some in French, that she had written in her medieval "Tour" in Saint-Loup-de-Naud, Seine-et-Marne, France – a gift from Winnaretta Singer.

PlaceBuilt in the XIII centuryThe Tower of the "High House” is the former stronghold of the priory of Saint-Loup. In the XV century, because of the ruin of the priory of Saint-Loup, it became property of local lords. It passed into the hands of the family de Saint-Phalle, and the Princess de Polignac, who gave it to her lover, Violet Trefusis. Trefusis received here her friends, like Marcel Proust, who came to visit and invented for his novel “In Search of Lost Time,” the character of the Marquis de Saint-Loup. Violet Trefusis held a literary salon here from 1945 to 1966. Upon her death, the property was sold and furniture dispersed. The Tower is classified as historical monuments by order of February 16, 1990.

LifeWho: Violet Trefusis, née Keppel; (June 6, 1894 – February 29, 1972) From 1923 to 1933, Violet Trefusis was one of the many lovers of the Singer sewing machine heiress Winnaretta Singer, daughter of Isaac Singer and wife of the homosexual Prince Edmond de Polignac, who introduced her to the artistic beau-monde in Paris. Trefusis conceded more and more to her mother’s model of being "socially acceptable" but, at the same time, not wavering in her sexuality. Singer, like Vita Sackville-West before her, dominated the relationship, though apparently to mutual satisfaction. The two were together for many years and seem to have been content. Trefusis’s mother, Alice Keppel, did not object to this affair, most likely because of Singer’s wealth and power, and the fact that Singer carried on the affair in a much more disciplined way than Vita Sackville-West. Trefusis seemed to prefer the role of the submissive and therefore fitted well with Singer, who, whip in hand, was typically dominant and in control in her relationships. Neither was completely faithful during their long affair, but, unlike Trefusis’s affair with Sackville-West, this seems to have had no negative effect on their understanding. Alvilde Chaplin, future wife of the author James Lees-Milne, was involved with Singer from 1938 to 1943; the two women were living together in London at the time of Winnaretta’s death. Violet Trefusis died at L’Ombrellino on the Bellosguardo on February 29, 1972. Her ashes were placed both in Florence and in Saint-Loup-de-Naud in the monks’ refectory near her tower.

House: In 1925, Alice Keppel and her husband moved to Italy. Their daughters stayed in Britain due to their marriages. They bought Villa dell’Ombrellino in Bellosguardo near Florence, however returned to Britain in 1940, due to WWII.

PlaceThe villa had been the home of the scientist Galileo, the poet Foscolo and the scholar C. E. Norton. Alice Keppel commissioned the architect Cecil Pinsent to lay out the villa terrace with bisecting paths, which she named a “Union Jack garden”; and after her death her daughter Violet Trefusis maintained the villa and its garden. Villa dell’Ombrellino on Bellosguardo is located in the square at number 11, in the neighborhood of Bellosguardo in Florence. The origins of the villa date back to 1372. For four years, the Villa di Bellosguardo, as it was called at that time, was inhabited by the Segni family, whose most illustrious member was the historian Bernardo Segni. In 1815 the villa was owned by the Countess Teresa Spinelli Albizi who had it completely restored. She placed on the large garden terrace that looks towards Florence a kind of iron sun Chinese umbrella that gave its name to the villa. In 1874 the building was purchased by the family Zoubow (Zubov.) Four years later, they joined it with the adjacent villa della Torricella. The merger of the two properties led to a remodeling of the two gardens, joined in one large romantic park, featuring many exotic species, such as palms, bamboo, cedar and gingko biloba. In the early years of the XX century the house passed to English woman Alice Keppel, famous beauty, known for being the favorite of Edward VII, exiled from the English court at the death of the king, which, to expand the view, demolished the Torricella, replacing it with a loggia for music. The whole park was littered with statues neo-XVI and XVIII century in Vicenza stone, concentrated particularly in the overlooking Florence. In 1926 this area of the garden was transformed into an "Italian garden,” with flower beds bordered by box hedges, by the English architect Cecil Pinsent. On the death of Alice Keppel in 1947, the villa was inherited by her eldest daughter, Violet Trefusis, which remained there until her death. Writer and essayist, Violet, which included friends and correspondents as Vita Sackville-West and François Mitterrand, has endeavored to maintain the villa and garden to the levels of the time of her mother, with a focus on flowers in pots and in the ground. The villa has had many famous guests. Galileo Galilei lived there between 1617 and 1631 and in those years he wrote his "Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems.” Anna Cora Mowatt known as Mrs. Ritchie, novelist and author of articles on the life and the events in Florence for American newspapers. Charles Eliot Norton, a scholar of Italian art and architecture, stayed all’Ombrellino between the end of 1870 and the spring of 1871. The impressionist painter Marcellin Desboutin, stayed there in the mid-XIX century. Until recently the villa was home to a conference center and services, but it’s now closed due to bankruptcy.

LifeWho: Violet Trefusis, née Keppel; (June 6, 1894 – February 29, 1972) In 1924, Alice Keppel bought L’Ombrellino, a large villa overlooking Florence. After her parents’ death in 1947, Violet Trefusis would become the chatelaine of L’Ombrellino till the end of her life. Trefusis died at L’Ombrellino on the Bellosguardo on February 29, 1972. She died of starvation, the effect of a malabsorption disease. Her ashes were placed both in Florence at the Cimitero degli Allori (The Evangelical Cemetery of Laurels) and in Saint-Loup-de-Naud in the monks’ refectory near her tower. In the 1990 BBC Mini-series “Portrait of a Marriage,” Violet Trefusis is portrayed by Cathryn Harrison.

Cemetery: Cimitero Evangelico agli Allori ("The Evangelical Cemetery of Laurels") is located in Florence, Italy, between 'Due Strade' and Galluzzo. The small cemetery was opened on February 26, 1860 when the non-Catholic communities of Florence could no longer bury their dead in the English Cemetery in Piazzale Donatello.

Address: Via Senese, 184, 50124 Firenze, Italy (43.74775, 11.22999)

PlaceThe Cemetery is named after the Allori farm where it was located. Initially a Protestant cemetery, the site is now private. Since 1970 it has accepted the dead of other denominations, including Muslims. The cemetery became newsworthy in 2006 when the writer and journalist Oriana Fallaci was buried there alongside her family and a stone memorial to Alexandros Panagoulis, her companion.

Notable queer burials at Cimitero Evangelico agli Allori:• Harold Acton (1904-1994), British writer. Harold Acton’s younger brother, William, a gay artist of modest achievement, died an apparent suicide in 1945. William Acton was a British visual artist who was born in 1906. Several works by the artist have been sold at auction, including 'Armiola' sold at Christie's New York 'Victorian, Pre-Raphaelite & British Impressionist Art' in 2016 for $23,080. • Robert Wiedeman Barrett Browning, known as Pen Browning, (1849–1912), English painter. His career was moderately successful, but he is better known as the son and heir of the celebrated English poets, Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.• Leo Ditrichstein (1865-1928), American actor and playwriter. Educated in Austria, Ditrichstein was the author of a number of plays, five of which were made into motion pictures. Worked with Gareth Hughes, Welsh actor in theater and film who worked primarily in the United States, and who, according to historian William J. Mann, was a "flaming little queen".• Alice Keppel (1868-1947), British mistress of Edward VII and mother of Violet Trefusis.• John Pope-Hennessy (1913-1994), British art historian.• Violet Page, aka Vernon Lee (1856-1935), British writer.• Charles Alexander Loeser (1864–1928), American art historian and art collector.• Osbert Sitwell (1892-1969), British writer.• Frederick Stibbert (1838-1906), British art collector.• Violet Trefusis (1894-1972), English and French writer.• Reginald Turner (1869-1938), British writer. Turner numbered among his friends Max Beerbohm, Lord Alfred Douglas, H. G. Wells, Arnold Bennett, Somerset Maugham, D. H. Lawrence, Oscar Wilde, Osbert Sitwell and others of the London literary scene during the late XIX and early XX century. S. N. Behrman said of him, "He was one of those men who talk like angels and write like pedestrians". Harold Acton agreed, writing of Turner's conversation, "One forgot to eat while he spun his fantasies." Beerbohm said, "He would be eloquent even were he dumb," and Maugham wrote, "Reggie Turner was, on the whole, the most amusing man I have known." After Wilde's death, Turner, who was homosexual, felt few ties to England.

William Colvig was an electrician and amateur musician who was the partner for 33 years of composer Lou Harrison, whom he met in San Francisco in 1967. Born: 1917Died: 2000Education: University of the PacificUniversity of California, BerkeleyLived: Harrison House, 6881 Mt Lassen Ave, Joshua Tree, CA 92252, USA (34.12816, -116.22678)Find A Grave Memorial# 161890125Partner: Lou Harrison

Lou Silver Harrison was an American composer. He was a student of Henry Cowell, Arnold Schoenberg, and KPH Notoprojo (formerly called KRT Wasitodiningrat, informally called Pak Cokro). William (Bill) Colvig was an electrician and amateur musician who was the partner for 33 years of Harrison, whom he met in San Francisco, California in 1967. Colvig helped construct the so-called "American gamelan“, a full Javanese-style gamelan, modeled on the instrumentation of Kyai Udan Mas at U.C. Berkeley. Harrison lived for many years with Colvig in Aptos, California. They purchased land in Joshua Tree, California, where they designed and built the Harrison House Retreat, a straw bale house. Harrison died in Lafayette, Indiana, from a heart attack while on his way to a festival of his music at The Ohio State University. Harrison is particularly noted for incorporating elements of the music of non-Western cultures into his work, with a number of pieces written for Javanese style gamelan instruments, including ensembles constructed and tuned by Harrison and his partner William Colvig. Together from 1967 to 2000: 33 years.William “Bill” Colvig (1917-2000)Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 - February 2, 2003)

Harrison House Music & Arts is a non-profit artist residency, performance and community arts program based in the late composer Lou Harrison’s desert retreat in Joshua Tree, California. In addition to providing an enriching creative setting to dedicated artists the program offers high-quality performing arts and workshops to the local and visiting community.Address: 6881 Mt Lassen Ave, Joshua Tree, CA 92252, USA (34.12816, -116.22678)Type: Guest Facility (open to public)Phone: +1 760-366-4712PlaceHarrison House is the straw bale "composer’s cave" that Lou Harrison completed in 2002 on the edge of Joshua Tree National Park. Of his chosen construction method Lou Harrison noted, "America grows enough straw in one year to satisfy all of its building needs." The design, inspired by the great Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy, is a unique structure featuring a vaulted hall that measures 36' X 12' with a sixteen foot ceiling-- proportions chosen by Harrison to create a superb and intimate sound environment for acoustic music. Harrison had one year to visit and enjoy his studio retreat where he worked on his final musical composition "Scenes from Nek Chand" for custom-made steel guitar. This structure is a special integration of design, form, materials, light, acoustics and history. The experience of being inside has been likened to a chapel, mosque or temple. It is a special gem of approximately 1,000 square feet. The vaulted main room is flanked on both sides by three equal-sized spaces. To the north are three outdoor patios separated by rounded buttresses. To the south is a "monkish" bedroom, a bathroom with all fixtures built into the corners, and a fully equipped kitchen in which Harrison’s long-time friend, and renowned artist/choreographer, Remy Charlip painted the cabinetry. Artists who have been in residence have continued to adorn the house with their work. Harrison chose Joshua Tree as the location for his retreat because the dry desert air agreed with him, the stark beauty and desert ecology attracted him and he delighted in taking his friends on tours of the area. A rich cultural history, surreal geological features and a fascinating variety of plants and animals describes the area in and around Joshua Tree National Park. The arts also hold a place in its history, including prehistoric petroglyphs and historic murals painted on buildings throughout the nearby town of Twentynine Palms. Artists have been visiting the Joshua Tree desert for decades to nourish their creativity and this burgeoning arts community continues to flourish. LifeWho: William “Bill” Colvig (1917-2000) and Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917- February 2, 2003)Lou Harrison was an American composer. Bill Colvig was an electrician and amateur musician who was the partner for 33 years of Harrison, whom he met in San Francisco, California in 1967. Harrison lived for many years with Colvig in Aptos, California. They purchased land in Joshua Tree, California, where they designed and built the Harrison House Retreat, a straw bale house. Harrison died in Lafayette, Indiana, from a heart attack while on his way to a festival of his music at The Ohio State University.